Taiwan Team Won Junior League Baseball World Series

With a score of 9-1, the baseball team from Taiwan, primarily made up of members of Chung-Ching Junior High School 重慶國中 of Taipei City, is the 2010 Junior League Baseball World Series Champion, beating the team from Texas. From the first time they participated in the Little League since 1969, teams from Taiwan has now won 18 World Series. Throughout the series of games, the Chung-Ching Junior LL Team did not lose one single game. Earlier this summer, another team from Taiwan also won the World Junior Baseball Championship held in Thunder Bay, Ontario, Canada. We now turn our attention to the 2010 Little League World Series held in Williamsport, Pennsylvania. So far, the team Fu-Hsing LL 復興少棒 from Kaohsiung has won its first game with a score of 18-0 against the team from Saudi Arabia.

Baseball was first introduced to Taiwan from the Japanese colonial rule, baseball of which was influenced by the US, back in as early as 1897. The first baseball team ever formed on the island (with actual historic record) was that of today’s Taipei Municipal Jianguo High School. Teams then sprang out through the entire island. As baseball became more and more popular in Taiwan, teams from Japan began to came to Taiwan for friendship games. At first, Japanese were winning all the games. But slowly, Taiwanese teams improved and many were invited to attend the then Japanese collegiate games. In 1945, Taiwan was returned under the rule of the Republic of China, while baseball became pretty much a part of people’s lives. At the same time, schools in Taiwan were forming their own baseball teams, most notable of all being a team from Taitung 台東紅葉少棒, which defeated the Japanese All Star Little League Team in 1968. In 1969, Taiwan won its first Little League World Series Championship, and began the winning streak of a total of 17 wins in the next 28 years, twice winning the championship for 5 years in a row. Taiwan withdrew its participation from the Little League in 1996 as it disagree with the relevant rules regulating how teams could be formed. It was only in 2009 that teams from Taiwan started to compete in the Little League again. We wish the Fu-Hsing LL the best of luck!